Hatori's Fabulously Random Adventure
by MurDoc
Summary: [In Progress] Hatori takes Ayame to get a new brush, brings Shigure along for the ride, and gets trapped inside everyone's worst nightmare: WALMART.
1. Dragboy goes to Wally World!

White strands of silvery hair blew in the wind as the tall snake-like man wove his way through a crowd standing in front of the latest display of a small street corner store. With him he dragged his loyal friends, Shigure and drag-boy, Hatori. Of course, Hatori Sohma was no drag queen, but Ayame himself and Shigure had found it absolutely hilarious when the two had come up with the nickname as a play on Hatori's dragon form. From that day on they addressed him as "drag-boy" whenever they could.

Ayame continued down the street at a higher speed than his two comrades, who followed at a leisurely pace. He just had to make it to the Wal Mart as soon as possible! If he didn't, then his new hairbrush might already be gone! He just couldn't think about that, though. The thing that he had to do now was make it to the store, and bring his friends with him.

Why he had wanted Shigure and Hatori along, he did not know.

Finally! He had made it to the large department store in the middle of the city! Deciding it might be better to wait on his companions, he stopped outside of the door and watched for them. Eventually, Shigure came alone at a nice skipping speed, while Hatori showed up a few seconds later... walking. Walking was so boring most of the time, but Hatori just made it look good.

"Ok. We're in and out, Ayame. I don't want to spend too long in this place." Hatori was the one imploring the overactive snakely one in front of him. Ayame nodded as if he were an obedient dog and clapped his hands together in glee after agreeing.

"Come on, 'Gure! They may be all gone!" The sentence wasn't totally finished before the two pranced off towards the personal care section of the store. Shigure didn't really care about what other people thought about his style of moving. He was a novelist. And Ayame was just a flaming queen, so it didn't matter either way to him. Hatori rolled his eyes and followed... walking. In the back of his mind, he wondered why Ayame didn't just go to one of the hair salon places and get a more expensive, nicer hairbrush if he cared so much about his mop.

Shigure went along with Ayame until their arrival at the hair-care department. Only, they never made it that far. Just as they were about to step over the threshold, whatever that happened to be, an extremely loud bang sounded from somewhere around the only entrance to the place. "Great." Ayame pouted, despite his curiosity nipping at him. The hairbrush would have to wait until a few minutes later.

"I suppose we should be going to see what that was?" Shigure had resumed his "normal" air and looked worriedly towards the distant doors. Ayame nodded his agreement and followed close behind as Shigure led the way. By now a small crowd had gathered around the automatic doorways. Something struck Shigure as funny, however. He couldn't see the light from the outside sun. As he glanced around, he noticed Hatori standing off to the side and away from the crowd, his arms crossed over his chest and a defeated look working its way on to his face.

"Oi! What's up, drag-boy? What happened?" Hatori didn't answer but pointed hurriedly to the doors as he face-faulted, his face coming in contact with the palm of his hand. Shigure's eyes followed the finger to the doors. Something was blocking the door! Completely, at that. Not a speck of light that wasn't from the overhead bulbs could be seen.

"What's happened here!" a middle aged man with an important-looking uniform demanded. A slather of muffled together voices answered his question. A small, young man, looking to be only 17 or so, pushed to the front of the crowd. He wore a blue vest, signaling that he was an employee at the store. "Something's blocking the way, sir!" "Don't make me smack you, boy. I can damn well tell that something is blocking the door!"

No one ever saw the employee again.

An hour passed as Hatori stood against the wall, watching intently with arms crossed over his chest, waiting to be let out of the store. Of course they'd get out soon. What was the government for, anyways, but to fix situations like this in an instant? "You can never trust them, though..." the doctor muttered out loud.

"Wha..? Ayame! He spoke!" Shigure had been sitting on the floor next to Hatori, watching the man for any sign of life. Ayame sat across from dog- man and perked up instantly. Hatori only gave them a small glare in response to their excitement and went back to wondering when he'd be able to get out. Ayame and Shigure pouted at the one standing above them and went back to gossiping among themselves until they were going to leave.

For some reason, Ayame always seemed to turn Shigure into just as much of a gossiping queen as he was whenever they were together.

"Sorry folks. Seems we can't figure out what is blocking the door. And the people outside aren't doing a very good job of moving that... thing. Very sorry, but it looks like we may be stuck here overnight."

Many protesting voices began yelling all at once and even more bodies leapt at Uniform Man.

Hatori's jaw would have hit the floor if he weren't so calm and civilized.

Shigure and Ayame's jaws hit the floor. They'd have to spend the night here? That could be a good thing, or a bad thing. Both had some devious plans already.

"Don't move."

"'Tori! You're no fun! We want to go... find a good place to sleep tonight! Yeah. It is getting on 8 o'clock already, you know. There have to be at least 300 people in here right now. All the good spots will be taken if we don't hurry!" Shigure knew he was being childish about it, and that it was just a department store, but there was fun to be had. Ayame nodded eagerly and agreed with his partner in crime.

Before Hatori could even make Ayame bow to his whim, the two were gone.

"I will not be responsible." The inwardly flustered doctor announced to no one and slid down the wall to a sitting position, at the same time rolling his jacket up and holding it absently against his chest. It was going to be a long night.


	2. Aya, they're dangerous!

Note: I'm using American currency because... I can. I'm not good with converting money, and besides, are there even Wal Marts in Japan? I have no idea.

Ayame and Shigure darted down an aisle, eyes peeled for potential mayhem. They found themselves near the kid's department by coincidence. Already, children of all ages were busily ripping new action figures out of boxes and pulling bicycles off of high racks.

"Can they do that?" Shigure nodded towards a particular adolescent who jumped onto a bike and rode off towards the other end of the store. "Don't they have any parents or anything? They're going to have to pay for that..." That may have been the most civilized thing Shigure had said all night. Ayame pondered quietly and nodded, agreeing with the other before they continued down the aisles.

Luckily, no vandalism had been done to the electronics department, and no one cared enough about the automotive department to get anything from there. The crafts department was occupied by a large group of old ladies who intermingled with one another as if it were a Sunday afternoon after church had dismissed.

A small, odd group of teenaged girls also slinked through the rows of rolled fabric and sewing supplies. Shigure's exceptional hearing picked up something about "cosplay" and overly expensive and crappy material. That was enough to convince him. He'd heard about that lot before. Best to keep away from them for now.

"Ahhh! My own territory!" Ayame sighed and gave a triumphant giggle as he began to saunter over to the group of girls in order to give them tips on where they should buy fabric. Like, say, at his store?

"No, Aya! They're... /dangerous/." Shigure clung desperately to his companion's sleeve, obviously fearing for both of their well being.

Ayame put his hands on his hips skeptically, wondering if Shigure was subliminally insulting the world of costuming, as that was his /profession, and eyed the other man closely. "Well, since they seem to be frightening you, I'll go quietly. This time." He laughed obliviously and continued on with Shigure.

The two continued past more sections of the large department store, stopping only to glance at the groups of people here and there that huddled together talking. Funny, how the same types of people always managed to find each other in the middle of large groups like this.

Aya almost made one attempt to mingle with a group huddled around the shampoo and hair care products, but the mission at hand kept him on task.

The couple ultimately found themselves near the women's dressing rooms, for lack of any superior place to settle down except for the toy department. Ayame scoffed at the rows of clothing that made up the small sector of the building. He was far higher class than these clothes could provide for.

Shigure in the mean time surveyed their current position. It wouldn't do at all. It just wasn't.../right/.

"Aya..." he started offhandedly, glancing behind him where the faint sound of children could be heard on the other end of the structure.

"Hm?" Ayame shuffled through a rack of tacky shirts nearby, throwing a couple over his should before looking at Shigure.

"How about we go kick some adolescent butt!" He lifted a fist into the air above his head in a triumphant gesture, giving it a good wave through the space it occupied.

Ayame's eyes widened slightly at the suggestion of going back to that child-infested place. His lips curled into a devious smile and he too raised his hand in the demented salute to the havoc weighing the air down around them.

Meanwhile, still idling near the front doors, Hatori sensed something was about to go terribly, terribly awry. The doctor attempted to block the sick feeling in his gut out, but it just would not go away. He ruffled his coat against his chest, shifting in his spot on the ground. As soon as those doors opened, he would be the first one out of that store; there was no doubt about that fact. But... there was still that small nuisance of having brought Ayame and Shigure here in the first place. He couldn't just leave them there. They were his friends after all, as much as he sometimes wished he could have denied it.

"I am still not responsible." Hatori gave a deep sigh and pulled himself to his feet. Brushing off his clothing out of habit, he sighed once more and set off to find his two companions, whatever trouble they might be causing.

A quick glance to his watch told him that it was nearing 9:00 at night. Though, still not as late as Hatori had hoped. The later it was, the closer his freedom would be.

The doctor spotted an unimportant young man standing very near to him, looking quite stressed himself. His whole image screamed quiet angst; therefore Hatori was attracted to the boy without actually knowing it. The kind of attraction one has when they find another of their kind among a crowd. That kind of magnetic thing that had made the cosplay girls find each other in the fabric department.

The boy said nothing. Hatori was the one to speak first, for a nice change of pace.

"I'll give you 20 dollars if you'll come get me the second there is a way out of this place. I don't care how." He pulled the bill out of his wallet and offered it to the teen. The boy looked up at him from where he sat, gauging the man's trustworthiness and took the money, stuffing it into his own pocket.

The inwardly tormented boy nodded and stood up, ready to find Hatori the instant and escape route was made known. "My name is Louis."

Hatori raised an eyebrow, having not asked the boy's name, and nodded. "Hatori. Let me know of an exit before midnight and I'll double what I just gave you." He really wasn't in the mood to stay at /Wal Mart/ all night.

Louis, who was now not unimportant, nodded meekly and paced off gracefully in search of any ways out of the large cement building in which 300 other people dwelt.

The doctor sighed with a little relief that he would be the first to know if he could get out of this forsaken building, and started off on his rescue slash capture mission.


	3. Spare a smoke?

No sign of his two companions were apparent as the troubled doctor weaved his way around little clusters of people scattered hither and thither. He let his mind wander a bit as he stared straight ahead, a few miscellaneous people looking at him as he passed by stealthily.

Off in the distance he would see the children's section looming ominously, almost as if it were taunting him. He knew that, if anywhere, that is where he would find his two companions, as much as he hated to admit it. Hatori was not very thrilled _at all_ about the idea of wading through children to find them.

The deeply stressed doctor decided that, much as he wanted to escape, it wouldn't come very soon. He took his sights off of his ultimate destination and veered off to the left, unsure of where his path would lead him. Hatori's eyebrow quirked up as he saw Louis darting past an isle as if Satan himself were biting at his heels, the boy's face wrought with determination and that same inner-torment.

He continued walking along the front of the large store in the opposite direction of the children's section, keeping relatively close to the cashiers' checkout isles. Up ahead, his eye caught a glimpse of something that hadn't occurred to him until that moment. A rather heavy wisp of smoke worked its way up towards the above iron rafters. The source of the smoke could not be seen from where he stood, but he didn't need to see its source.

He knew that smoke.

Hatori continued coolly until he reached the source of the smoke. A lone adult man leaned against a rack of Tupperware bowls; his golden-yellow hair gleaming in a slightly unnatural manner. As the doctor approached, the blonde glanced up from apparent concentration on the tobacco stick in his mouth just long enough to acknowledge Hatori's approach, and looked back down with a nearly silent humph.

Hatori nodded at the man and continued past him a ways, until he found the cigarette checkout lane. Ah, sweet victory.

The doctor pulled a worn leather wallet out of his pocket, pulling from it a few bills, paid the middle-aged woman guarding the cases of cancerous cigarettes, and headed back towards the blonde man with his newly acquired stress-relief.

The mysterious blonde lifted his head again and looked slightly more than uninterested. Hatori pulled a cigarette from the new pack and slipped it between his lips, giving the other one of those masculine "looks". It was the look that involved no actual movement, but could say a million different things. The other look involved inclining the chin slightly in a "come hither" manner, which could also mean hello or a plethora of many other things. This particular look, without the chin wave, happened to mean, "Have a light?"

The blonde huffed slightly and dug around in his pocket for the lighter he'd used only a few minute previous. Hatori noticed a small photo-sticker stuck to the side of the silver lighter; a young man with unruly pink hair occupied the photo along with the blonde who now held the lighter. An odd match, Hatori thought in the back of his mind.

A split second later, Hatori forgot all about the sticker.

Exquisite smoke filled his lungs as he took a deep drag off of the cigarette. The smoke momentarily took his mind off of the stress, which he knew awaited him in the next while.

Hatori sighed, nodded thanks to the blonde man, and continued on his way, a weak trail of gray smoke following him.

"Now, if I were an idiot... where would I be?" he muttered quietly to himself as he walked slowly towards the rear of the department store. Idiot was, of course, Shigure and Ayame.

Eventually Hatori found himself in the fabric department located at the rear of the building, figuring that as a likely point for at least one of his companions. His eyes scanned the rows of colorful fabric, carefully picking among the knots of old women in search of a mop of long platinum hair. At one point his eyes stopped on a group of teenaged girls, some of whom were giving him odd looks, but did not think too much of it at that moment.

Seeing nothing of which he desired, he decided the next most likely spot he might find the others would have to be the women's clothing department. Come on, this is Ayame we're talking about here. Why /wouldn't/ he take an opportunity to look at clothes?


End file.
